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Sunday, October 5th, 2008
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I have the unfortunate predicament of having to take a shower after Anya has vacated the bathroom. You see, she leaves an hour before I do so when I enter the bathroom to do my morning constitution I am entering HER bathroom, the way she likes it. I am entirely too groggy to even represent a sentient being as I stumble into the shower, completely forgetting (once again) that she recently procured a high velocity shower head that at one time during its product development stage must have been considered for stripping paint or for dispersing a riotous assembly. There are several settings on this shower and in my incapacitated state I never check the setting. Now mind you, there are several settings on this shower head that I like such as "summer rain", "mist", etc and then there is her favorite setting "massage" which is nothing of the sort. Now when I think of massage, I conjure up images of relaxation, the soft, inquiring hands of a 21-year-old Scandinavian woman, and possibly an exchange of cash. Unfortunately the truth of the matter is that the setting could be more accurately described as "beaten by thugs." Adding to the misery is her penchant for numbingly cold showers as if obeying some ancient protocol of her ancestral past in which the weak and infirmed were weeded out through tests of extreme endurance. Today, I stumbled sleepy-eyed into the shower, wrenched it on, and was immediately hit by a roar of icy water travelling at one thousand miles an hour, immediately transforming my face into a pose primarily reminiscent of test chimpanzees in the Mercury space program when encountering severe G-forces upon re-entry.
Five seconds later (after my eyes have dilated, my lips curled and my testicles have disappeared) I am able to adjust the settings to a reasonable level that will not induce pneumonia. Now it is time to lather what little epidermis has not been pulled away. I absent-mindedly grab the soap and began spreading a film of what can only be described as having the iridescent sheen of a sunlit pond. At this point I realize I have grabbed one of her herbal soaps whose claims to promote a "calm tranquility" is only matched by its ridiculously exorbitant price, as if some indigenous tribe deep within the Amazon brought forth a herbal extract made from the rarest of tropical plants. She has bought a dozen of these soaps from small upscale stores, each bar representing a desired emotion or some facet of relaxation. Unfortunately though, my only experiences with these soaps present one of bewildered terror as I question why my skin has suddenly turned taupe. It seems I always end up getting the soap that markets itself as "mind altering peyote."
I try to find my essentials (such as a razor) among a staggering array of lotions, gels and lubricants, each with some specified purpose; for the life of me I have not the foggiest notion, outside of a porn setting, what these are used for. In addition there are enough fragrances and perfumes to gas a small battalion into paralysis.
Forty-five minutes later, as I enter my place of occupation I get a phone call from her.
"I hope you did not mess up the bathroom again."
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Comments: Read 1 or Add Your Own.
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We were getting up to leave, my comrades and I, from one of the few restaurants that stayed open at a diabolical hour late that Friday evening, when I heard my name being called with great enthusiasm.
Looking up, I noticed several individuals making their way to where I was in a somewhat excited manner. It was then that I recognized two of them, the apparent ringleaders of an approaching bevy of beauties that seemed to be in possession of some illustrious secret, evident by their hushed exclamations of joy concerning whatever subject matter was at hand. They conversed in hushed tones punctuated with high-pitched squeals, reminiscent to what one hears when you back your car over a fat person.
The two individuals were sisters and have been friends of mine for some time; in fact I briefly dated the older one several years ago, a tortuous and confused relationship whose memory resonates within me a similarity to those testimonials and first hand accounts one usually associates with victims of the Khmer Rouge.
For the purposes of this account, let us refer to these two women as "Rene" and "Erica."
Both are attractive and have at times used their physical beauty to their advantage, though not always successfully. Both are reasonably (somewhat) in command of their mental faculties; one is simple-minded and the other normal, though it is hard to tell the difference unless someone hands them each a yo-yo.
After exchanging salutations, the girls told me of their acquisition of yet another in a long series of tattoos, a topic rivaling "moss formations" for my attention span. This time though, instead of the usual adornment of pop cultural icons or some other clichéd visual image, they had received a very different tattoo, one that had placed them (at least in their thinking) on a higher intellectual plain.
Normally, they know that the simple acquisition of a tattoo would not interest me in the slightest, but there was a tenuous link between the images (that all of them had collectively and permanently put on their wrists) and me, or so they thought. They had decided to get a tattoo of the symbol that represents the concept of infinity. It looks like a horizontal number eight.
However, on this particular night the muse was upon them and they decided to stretch the boundaries of science by completing this odd imprint with what appeared to them as an earth shattering revelation; thusly (captured image via cell phone):
They proudly informed me that the tattoo was "infinity times infinity." There was silence as I contemplated what was surely one of the unmistakable signs of the decline of Western civilization. They told me that I could (somehow) identify with this tattoo in that I had an ambient electronic music show that featured ethereal and surreal music; therefore it only reasons that I would find this tattoo attractive. I did, in fact, find the tattoo, represented on four separate wrists thrust in my direction with sleeves rolled up, mesmerizing; but not quite for the reasons desired by my inked comrades.
As my astonishment receded, I quietly and with as much self control one could muster under the circumstances, asked exactly what this meant. It was then explained to me in the following manner.
"Well, you know how infinity is supposed to stretch forever?"
I replied that I was indeed aware of the definition of infinity.
"Well now it is twice as long!"
"Girls, how can something that is supposed to last forever be twice as long?"
There was silence as cogs and wheels turned around me and then stopped. Their eyes suddenly became vacant, a vacuous abyss that slowly surrounded their fragile world. Erika slowly turned her wrist 180 degrees so it no longer faced me. Rene began blinking furiously and continued her long held penchant of reciting the names of planets when confused by a cerebral dilemma. Stares were exchanged but alas, the muse had left (or rather simply died). One of the four drew her wristwatch discreetly over the aforementioned image, replacing the infinity symbol with the simple device that kept pace with the temporal world as she knew it.
Somewhere in the distance the clinking of dishes, pots and pans, enveloped within the ambient noise of the eatery's kitchen interceded on their behalf, and a waitress asked them if they would like to be seated.
I love those two girls as if they were my very own (highly) retarded sisters.
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Comments: Read 3 or Add Your Own.
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Wednesday, December 12th, 2007
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My wife is now five months pregnant and has developed the emotional stability of Caligula. Since this realization we now solve most of our disagreements short of exchanging gunfire, basically she is right and I am wrong, regardless of the subject matter. Her sense of smell and cognizant awareness of her surroundings would be the envy of any field DEA investigation. Her sudden development of heightened sensory perception has made her minutely susceptible to any smells, sounds, or sights she finds uncomfortable. Because of these recent physiological developments she is now uniquely qualified to be of service in many areas, from detecting a propane leak to exposing land mines. However, the travails of enduring a pregnant, strong willed woman has its amusing moments as well.
The following is but one of 826 events that have occurred unexpectedly while in the company of my loving pregnant wife. For the past several months, she has picked up an engaging hobby to add to her already eclectic collection of interests: projectile vomiting. She will indulge in this hobby at any moment, at any public venue or within any intimate private setting. There is barely any rhyme or reason in determining at what time she will indulge in this unique hobby; the sudden whiff of a disagreeable scent, an unpleasant recollection, watching an episode of Mama's Family (in all honesty I share the same predicament on this last example).
I was driving her to the airport a month ago; she had to leave for Portland in connection with her job at Nike. While driving up to the terminal, we were laughing and joking about what would happen if she suddenly had to throw up on the plane. Would she base the recipient receiving the unwarranted attention on class distinction? Would she, for example, throw up on the "business type executive" or on the fat golf addict on his way to some sports themed resort? What distinction in class would she differentiate between in deciding on whom to throw up on? Would she apply the choice in victim within Marxist class parameters or strictly that of subjective stereotyping? Would the working class hero make less of a fuss than say, the spoiled teenager nodding rhythmically within the deceptively safe confines of cheap headphones?
What if she had time though to know her fellow passengers sitting next to her? Maybe she might find the passenger to her right a delightful partner in engaging in agreeable conversation and the one to the left of her an obnoxious and repellent individual. Ahh, then the choice would be easy. This caused no small amount of laughter on our part as I pulled up to the Northwest terminal. The more she thought about it, the more she began to giggle uncontrollably.
Then the issue was solved.
She threw up on me.
My love for her shines with the same radiance that Blue Cheer detergent bestows to a recently soiled t-shirt.
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Tuesday, December 11th, 2007
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About two months ago I thought I was dying. I was in the local Subway when all of the sudden I had trouble clearly seeing the fast food menu on the wall; now while in separate circumstances this may be a good thing, in this particular case it was not. I started seeing bright flashing lights and a substantial loss of peripheral vision. The possibilities ran through my mind. A stroke? Retinal detachment? Had I unknowingly but forcefully collided with a wayward disco ball? The sudden realization that the individual behind the glass counter was not a DJ but instead a second shift manager named Ranjit quickly discounted the third possibility.
While the attack was going on I was actually having lunch with a friend of mine who is a Lutheran pastor (good company to have when you think you are dying) so he was able to drive me to the hospital (as my sight was affected), during which time I did the usual actions when one thinks he is facing dire mortal circumstances (making my peace with God, thinking of Kansas lyrics, and bizarrely wondering if I fed the cats). Unfortunately, my friend does not know how to drive a stick very well (I had picked him up) and we exited the parking lot at 50 mph in second gear. It was a bit disconcerting to realize that the sweet sound of descending angels would be preceded by the grate and whine of an over worked four cylinder Toyota engine. I was able to call my wife (amid exhortations to "switch into third") and let her know what was happening. We reached the hospital in less time than it took for me to sing "Dust in the Wind" and I was met by a plump nurse who proceeded to question me with pneumatic regularity about every medication I have taken since the fifth grade. At this point I began hallucinating, imagining myself strangling her with thick battery cables, testament to my annoyance at filling out a questionnaire that seemed only slightly shorter in length than that of the "Brothers Karamazov."
My wife, who is about as subtle as the Berlin Wall, burst through a barricade of protesting nurses and found me being evaluated deep within the confines of some trauma center. Her sudden appearance startled, ever so briefly, the ER doctor; her penchant for wearing all black (in accordance with some long forgotten Soviet protocol concerning Gulag interrogators) coupled with a semi-explosive entrance into the ER, caused him to momentarily fumble with his sphygmomanometer. For a brief second I imagined that he was prepared to confess to my wife a lengthy list of crimes against the state as well as implicating half of the medical staff present within the building.
I, of course, know how deeply sensitive my wife can be, and I had to assure the Doctor that her comment that the nurses were "loathsome vermin fit only for extermination" was meant in only a loving and caring manner.
Now while I may jest now, it was not so jovial then. It took awhile for the tests to get done and the prognosis made, only then did I relax. So, the end result was that I had a simple aural migraine. My first one apparently; later that night I had a headache that would not allow me to sleep for the duration of most of the night. I took enough Nyquil and aspirin to drop a rhino, but it still felt as if I was being randomly beaten with a ball ping hammer. But as the night progressed, it subsided.
So I am happy for two reasons. The first, that everything is ok, and the second, that I have finally found justification to use the word "sphygmomanometer" in conversation within mixed company.
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Comments: Read 3 or Add Your Own.
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For those that are interested, my radio program ("Into the Deep") featuring ambient/electronic music is on tonight (every Monday night) at eight pm to midnight Central Standard Time on WEVL. It is one of the longest running ambient radio shows in the country at thirteen years.
The radio station broadcasts it online at their website here if you would like to listen: http://wevl.org/webcast.php
The first half is chill, ambient beat, downtempo, etc and the second half is darker drone and atmospheric material. If you are online tonight, give it a listen!
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Comments: Read 1 or Add Your Own.
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Wednesday, November 8th, 2006
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I have not updated my journal in quite a long time. Not that anyone has noticed of course, but nevertheless I think that I will make the endeavor to update on a somewhat semi consistent basis. So up with the antenna, and let the muse descend upon me.
In exactly four minutes it will be my birthday and I will have turned 42. 42!? Amazing! Where did the time go? I certainly do not feel 42. In fact, the only thing that I feel is the accompanying astonishment that I am exactly 42 years of age.
I shan't let this bother me. I shan't I tell you I shan't.
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Comments: Read 5 or Add Your Own.
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Sometimes I think I can be more than what I am, sometimes I don't. The very fact that I can be honest about it means that I am becoming more than what I was.
Mother of pearl, I sound like an Army recruitment poster.
Are you what is pictured within a sturdy frame or are you the one who contemplates? Boring, yet steadfast routine versus fanciful, yet illusionary daydreaming. I get caught fighting both. I am probably somewhere behind the curtain. Don't mind me, I'm not coming out. If someone knocks on the door, tell them we are not in.....
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Comments: Read 3 or Add Your Own.
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Saturday, March 18th, 2006
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Thursday, September 29th, 2005
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Thursday, September 15th, 2005
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It is raining today. Spent the day inside reading Nikolai Berdyaev. A couple of quotes on a rainy day:
"The entire world is nothing in comparison with human personality, with the unique person of a man, with his unique fate."
"...original and authentic Christianity, based upon truth which had been neither objectivized nor socialized, would be a personalistic revolution in the world."
"Truth is not so much liberation and salvation in this world, as it is liberation and salvation from this world. Full acceptance of the truth of the Gospel, consent to its actual realization, would lead to the destruction of the states, civilizations, societies organized according to the laws of this world - to the end of this world which in every way is opposite to the Gospel Truth: therefore men and nations have corrected the Gospel, filled it with 'truths' of this world which were really pragmatic, because they were false and adapted to falsehood. The recognition and the confession of truth is connected, not with usefulness and profit, but with risk and danger...."
"Truth is subjective; it is individual, and universal in its individuality...."
"The question of bread for myself is a material question, but the question of bread for my neighbor is a spiritual question."
"Our attitude to all men would be Christian if we regarded them as though they were dying and determined our relation to them in the light of death, both of their death and our own.
A person who is dying calls for a special kind of feeling. Our attitude to him is at once softened and lifted onto a higher plane. We can then feel compassion for people whom we do not love.
But every man is dying, I too am dying and must never forget about death."
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Monday, August 29th, 2005
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An FYI:
My ambient radio show, that I have had for 11 years on WEVL (FM89.9 Memphis), is broadcast every Monday night on the web at http://www.wevl.org/webcast.html.
I divide my show into two parts:
8pm-10pm (Central Standard Time): progressive ambient beat
10pm-12am (Central Standard Time): drone and ethereal ambient
If you shoot me an email, I will say hello to you: bionaut@lycos.com
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Comments: Read 4 or Add Your Own.
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Wednesday, July 13th, 2005
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My neighbor is but a simple man, an ex-marine whose outlook on life is shrouded within the tight confines of Lynryd Sknyrd songs, soft-porn skin flicks and a prodigious quantity of beer consumed by him and his comrades as they stand in waist-high water in his out-door, above ground pool. Humming softly the long forgotten anthems of self described southern troubadours, I saw him glance over the fence separating not only our property lines but differing worldviews as well. After a few seconds of careful introspection he asked what my wife and I were looking at. “A frog.” He stared at us warily, in the same way one does when told that your neighbors may or may not have buried someone in the back yard. Normally watching a frog would not illicit such a response, but this is only a step in what I call “bringing my neighbor to the brink of insanity.” No, this descent into madness began several months earlier with the following innocuous statement he uttered one lazy evening.
“Hey man, what’s that sound you’re playing?” My ex-marine neighbor asked me, taking the time to actually engage me in conversation, an activity usually punctuated by his long stares at my wife as she bends over and attends to her garden. He was drawn to the sounds of music coming from within the confines of my living room. I looked up from my chair on my porch, slightly disturbed at the interruption into which was up till that point a very entertaining reading regarding the evils of moral relativism. It was at this moment that I consciously decided to alleviate this man of the constraints of rational behavior. “Sound distortion generators,” I replied casually. You see, I was playing a drone cd (for those not familiar with this genre, it is a series of ethereal repetitive drones that loop for long periods of time).
“Sound distortion generators? What the hell is that?” I looked up as he stared at me, slid my sunglasses down my nose to add gravity to the situation and slowly made my way over to the fence where his upper torso leaned over the top of the fence. In a subdued voice I told him that I was running a series of sound distortion generators in an effort to slow time. His eyes widened upon the completion of my explanation as he stared at me and then at his buddies who were all waist high in his pool, the water only a few degrees cooler than the hot ambient temperature that the month of June provided, testament to the sweat rolling off their distended bellies into the water below. He muffled a quick summary to his comrades on my startling revelation and they all crossed over to the side of the pool closest to the fence, threatening to capsize their redneck paradise.
“What do you mean you are trying to bend time?” he asked incredulously. I replied with a quick summary into what could have easily been key components within any pseudo-scientific explanation. “Well we know what speed that sound travels right?” They all nodded. “And we know that the greater the distance, the longer it takes for sound to reach us. Therefore, if I can distort sound, and thereby slow the approach of the sound waves in question I then can distort the time continuum that regulates as to how fast the sound reaches me.” “Well, how can you slow speed down through sound?” one of his comrades in the back asked (evidently one of them had a education surpassing that of the eighth grade). “Well for starters, we know that sound travels faster in water than in air right?” They all nodded again. “Therefore, if I can change the way that sound is introduced I can therefore subjugate the speed that it reaches me in, thereby changing the amount of time it reaches me. And if I can do this, I then change how time is measured within the space of my generators as opposed to how it is measured by those who cannot hear my generators.” They all stood quietly within the confines of their beer laden aquatic paradise, each trying to decipher what I said in the summer haze. Pausing for added effect I then replied, “In other words, I am attempting to slow time.”
At that very moment my wife’s best friend walked into the backyard to talk to my wife. As Anya and Valeria talked in their native tongue, the group opposite me stared at what surely gave credence to my recent exhortations, two individuals chattering in Russian pointing this way and that only increased the mystery of it all; cold war images of shadowy Soviet scientists suddenly adding deadly seriousness to the situation. I walked back to the porch, audibly aware of the muffled conversations that discussed my earth shattering revelation.
The next morning I was again outside on my porch reading. And once again my neighbor and his comrades were enjoying life to the fullest, at least that which 900 gallons of warm water, cheap beer, and the ballads of Foghat could provide. Hearing more weird music emanating from within the confines of my living room, my neighbor again beckoned me over. This time though I waited several seconds to answer, whipping my head around as if he just asked a question. I did this repeatedly until the group of them noticed that there was an inherent two-second delay between question and answer, all the while I acted as if I was oblivious to this fact. They were stunned, “Shit, he has done it!” Immediately, my highly susceptible neighbor called out in a voice of panic, “Dude, do you know you are a couple of seconds off in your responses to our questions?” Waiting a few seconds I looked up and asked, “I am?” Panic ensued as the group of them rushed the fence, a sea of worried, apprehensive faces peered over the fence at me. “Hey Allan, this is getting weird man, you need to shut those generators off.” Again I waited a few seconds and replied, “What are you guys talking about?” “Dude, you are a couple of seconds behind us and don’t realize it!” Appearing suddenly “frightened” I backed into the house and sat on my couch out of view, all the while hearing certain words in the conversation next door such as “CIA, physics, danger, fucked-up” etc.
Coming soon: Convincing my neighbors that mirrors are really portals into a parallel universe…..
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Comments: Read 11 or Add Your Own.
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She was small. And very quick. She had stolen from us before but at the time we did not know who it was. Calcutta is an incredibly overpopulated city teeming with life in all its myriad forms. The rich, the poor, the strong, the dying; they move among each other like so much debris in a fast moving stream. There were four of us, re-lining some pipe deep under the ground so that they could receive an adequate sewage system. We were working in a poverty stricken section of this disheveled metropolis. Every morning I watched the dying and the dead pulled from the streets so as not to impede the flow of traffic, I watched as horns blazed at frail bodies too weak to crawl away without assistance. What is it like to sleep in your own filth? To welcome death as a release? To be contained in a caste system in which your very existence determines your standing and your standing determines your existence?
The first time we noticed something missing we marked it up to simple negligence on our part. A couple of hand tools here and there. No big deal. The second and then third time the thief struck in so many days convinced us that we indeed had a thief among us, irregardless of how much we tried to keep an eye on our tools. We simply just could not lock up our gear as we needed a variety of them throughout the day in a job so specialized that it necessitated our visit there in the first place. As time passed we became vigilant in our efforts to catch this thief. Throughout the afternoon, I would intermittently look up and scan the mass of people within our area, searching for an individual who would fit a horribly misconceived stereotype of delinquency, though at the time we did not find fault with the visual template we constructed in our heads. People who met our gaze were immediately assigned an inherent measure of guilt depending on how we viewed them. I searched for this elusive antagonist in vain; though tempted as I was to simply mark the thief’s success to deviltry, I finally spotted this 50-pound anomaly through the most unlikely of circumstances…
At the end of one grueling day, we noticed that once again we were missing a tool. Cursing our inability to catch this denizen of the underworld, we loaded our gear into our large vehicle (similar in size to a UPS van). As I entered the cabin, the wind picked up right when I opened the door and the work permit on the dashboard fluttered out and directly flew under the van. I bounded down and dropped to my knees to retrieve it when lo and behold, I stared into the face of a small girl lying under the van, clutching our missing tool in her dirty hand. Without hesitation I began yelling to my comrades. I found her! “Found who?” was the reply by my comrades. The thief, I yelled! She’s under the van! Tools were dropped as my comrades dropped to all fours from their respective positions. She began to panic as we began to draw a net around her; we began interspersing our comments with threats and exhortations: "Come here you little fucker! Be a good girl and come on out. Here honey, we are not going to hurt you, crawl out." I locked eyes with her as she looked at me and then to the other side of the van, she exhaled deeply and made a break for it. I began screaming to my friends to get to the other side. She scrambled out as we turned the corner. The chase was on. She was no amateur; knowing that she could not win a foot race with us she dived into the ever-moving crowd where we could not see her. She disappeared from view but we were able to track her quickly by noticing the moving heads of the adults who noticed a small girl in full flight glide past them. We panned out and dove into the crowd, watching the sea of flesh part as we pursued our prey. Scott was the first to reestablish a visual on her and shouted out to me that she was doubling back, running toward a series of hundreds of vendors selling their wares. She crawled under numerous tables, much to the consternation of the vendors; all the while I was trying to calculate where she would come out while being pursued by my comrades. I sprinted ahead and jumped on top of a large table sparsely loaded with caged chickens as my friends herded her like an errant sheep. With impeccable synchronicity, she exited right below me, not noticing as I quietly jumped down and closed the gap between us quickly. I reached out to grab her when she looked back, saw me, panicked and made a hard left down a small flight of stairs leading to some fishing docks. I grabbed her and as I drew her to me, she lost her footing and tumbled down but thankfully I was able to cocoon her close me as she fell. Unfortunately I also tripped down the stairs while trying to ensnare my quarry. I immediately wrapped my arms around her and turned my shoulder and back to the ground to cushion her against the fall. I hit first and she seemed to bounce a foot off my chest into the air. My comrades came running up, breathless from both exertion and excitement as I sat her onto the ground. As we surrounded her she promptly shielded her face, evidently expecting a flurry of blows. This bothered me, this action was obviously indicative of her being beaten in the recent past. She slowly looked through spaced fingers at me as I smiled and rubbed her head. Trembling she lowered her arms and just looked at us. Scott kneeled down beside me and said, “So this is the thief that has been stealing from us the whole time.” “Yea,” I replied, “evidently she would stay under the van after nicking our tools and would simply wait for us to drive away and then get up. A very patient thief.”
She was painfully skinny and her clothes (or what was left of them) were ragged and torn. She struggled to hold on to her femininity, evident by the rings fashioned out of discarded paper that she adorned her fingers with. I picked up the tool that she dropped, hoisted her up on my shoulders and walked over to a small stand that was selling roasted chicken. I pushed some money into the vendor’s hands and wrapped up a sizeable meal into some napkins and thrust it into her tiny hands. Still riding on my shoulders, I could hear her above me consuming the meal with no small measure of ferocity as I made my way back to our work site, making sure that I put distance between her and the angry vendors who glared at the diminutive girl who had disturbed their wares only shortly before. Several hundred yards away I let her down, and after a brief interval in which she stared at me, she quickly danced back into the crowd, furtive glances thrown in my direction, all the while consuming what the casual observer might ensue as a last meal.
We went back to work, jokingly passing the day talking about the recent episode. As the sun began to set, we secured everything and went back to the hotel. The next morning, while repairing the robotic camera/cutter we had in use, I looked up from the back of the van and saw the little girl cautiously approaching me, holding something in her hand as she struggled to climb into the van……
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Comments: Read 8 or Add Your Own.
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This is re-fucking-diculous. 60 days. 5000 miles. Two years.
In 60 days the gate opens or closes. 60 days to knowing which path I take.
Blood and sweat never equals security.
Я, котор нужно жить в России? Я сделаю в moscow? Он к холоду и я не могу поговорить язык very well! Я дать вверх моих друзей, моей семьи, моего нот, моих хобби на жизнь в холоде. Я пойду где-либо для моего супруги, я никогда не буду покидать ее. Я люблю ее.
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Comments: Read 2 or Add Your Own.
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Thursday, April 7th, 2005
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Saturday A.M. Lying in bed.
Anya: I want to go gardening, but I can't.
Allan: Why?
Anya: The meteorologist said there is a storm coming in. 100% chance evidently.
Allan: Oh.
Saturday P.M. Lying in bed.
Anya: Stupid weatherman. He said it was going to rain today so I did not do any planting thinking the storm was on the way.
Allan: Sorry.
Anya: I think the meteorologist should be cut up into bite sized pieces and fed to wild dogs.
Allan: What?
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Comments: Read 4 or Add Your Own.
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Monday, February 7th, 2005
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Wednesday, January 26th, 2005
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This weekend was exhausting, exhilarating and frustrating all rolled into one. I spent a total of thirty hours over saturday and sunday staring at a chess board. Nine am to midnight both days, struggling to vanquish my comrades and capture the crown of the city candidates championship. Thousands of calculations went through my head, all the while being vaguely aware that time just stopped for me; for the better part of two days I do not remember doing anything but going through a myriad of combinations punctuated at night by a few hours of sleep. The number of neurons firing off in my head must have been a personal best. I ended up winning, tying two others for first:(http://www.homestead.com/memphischessclub/candidates2005.html). I was in the Commercial Appeal and the Memphis Flyer as well as on TV. Not that the exposure for me was important as much as it is for chess in general and specifically for women. For this account of my tactical prowess is merely the backdrop for the observation as follows....
Grandmaster Palatnik (http://www.chessinn.com/) is one of the strongest players in the world. He has previously held the title of champion both in the former Soviet Union and in Europe. For those of you not familiar with the ranking system used in chess, a grandmaster is the highest rank obtainable, one of only a handful in the world. Their powers of concentration are so immense that I once saw him play 15 good chess players simultaneously at the same time and destroy them.....blindfolded. He only plays in national tournaments held across the world and does not "trifle" with small accomplishments such as the city championship (there-bye allowing me to win). On Sunday Palatnik gave a simul with the proceeds going to the Tsunami Relief fund (http://www.homestead.com/memphischessclub/Tsunami.html). A simul is when a Grandmaster plays a large number of people at the same time, walking around in a large circle moving from board to board. For the willing participant the question is not who will win (for this is a forgone conclusion but who will last the longest). Somewhat akin to re-arranging the deck chairs on the Titanic; someone may do a nicer job but the end result is guaranteed. Fifty players piled into the Hilton with twice that watching. As the players took their seats in front of their respective boards I noticed a small, petite young girl (dropped off by her mother) join the fray. With her ponytails bobbing rhythmically with the placement of her pieces, she quietly took position behind the board, paper and pen in hand (to record the notation of the game) and patiently awaited the start of the festivities. I went back to answering questions from the prospective players (as I and several of my chess playing comrades from the club were helping Palatnik in his preparation, lending service as assistants, making ready the slaughter). Most of the participants were adults, however there were a significant amount of adolescents and young boys playing as well. I noticed that the young girl sat alone but not by choice as several of her male compatriots (roughly her age) left their seats when she sat next to them and sought other positions elsewhere within the circle, not wanting to be associated with some "girl" who adopted such audacious behavior as to actually think that she could compete in such a male dominated sport.
The simul began, and a lucid hush descended upon the room like a thick shroud. Gradually, quiet conversations took on significant importance for in a simul players may give advice one to another. I noticed brain trusts forming, as collectives sought answers to their positional dilemmas. The demographics were obviously influenced by age as the adults worked together and the children and teenagers (all male) worked feverishly to extricate themselves from their inferior calculations. But the girl worked alone, and not by choice as her comrades shunned her on account of her sex, and expected her to exit quickly through some disastrous defeat. I made my way to her noticing that throughout the past hour she barely stirred, so focused was she on the board. As her glasses slipped down her nose I could see her silently mouthing the calculations, however shallow, her eyes darting from one square to the next. A short distance away I stood watching her survey the board with all the confidence of a well rounded tactician. I did not think she would last long so I approached her and asked if she would like a soda. She looked up at me and stated nothing, probably obeying the age old adage on talking to strangers or heeding her mother's advice on the way there to watch out for older men, etc. After briefly looking at her position on the board I smiled to reassure her that my intentions were honest and walked away to attend to the other players when I heard her quietly say to me, "Be2-c5-0-0-Nbd7." I stopped dead in my tracks and turned around. She saw something, and it was something I did not expect her to see. Responding back in the language of chess notation (which is based on a algebraic grid to to describe existing moves and to simulate future ones), I replied "QxN" in which she quickly replied "Rxa3 sac, queen lost to Bxd7." I promptly returned to her board and dropped to one knee beside her, running the calculation through for validity. I was impressed, one so young that saw beyond what I thought she was capable of. I spoke to her slowly, extending the calculation several moves ahead, letting her see the board in her mind as I had seen it. She was silent for almost a full minute when her eyes widened and she grabbed my hand to acknowledge that she now grasped the additional moves. That is when I saw it in her eyes. She had that fire but it was a fire born of judicious combustion. Her grasp of positional play had stunned me and I knew that this one was different. I wanted to train her. To turn her into a calculating monster. I envisioned her smashing fragile male egos and holding court over weakened opponents, their phrenic insolence melting into the floor.
One by one, the younger players were dispatched, yet she hung on. One by one the boys that ignored and castigated her had to walk past her in defeat as she played on, a testament to their own arrogant stupidity. Now only the adults and one child remained...this shy ten year old girl who dared tread where young girls have been told not to tread. I was not the only one impressed, Palatnik was impressed as well, so much so that he offered her a draw (though like everyone else she was clearly losing, and badly at that). But her desperate and hard fought play, so rare in one so young and in a young girl at that, earned recognition as the great Grandmaster offered her a draw and shook her hand telling her loudly enough for everyone to hear that her skill impressed him. The boys stood in stunned silence as she beamed with pride as the word "draw" was written in her scoresheet, one of only three draws that night given to those who exhibited unique play within their demographic.
As if on cue, her mother strode in and locating her child told her to pack her stuff up for she had school on the morrow. I approached the mother and told her of her daughter's great accomplishment, curiously though it did not register with her. I repeated again that I was very impressed with her daughter, all the while her daughter beamed with pride as I recounted what she had done. Her mother grew agitated and told me that it was just a game. I replied that while it is indeed "just a game" there are beneficial results of being good at chess such as increased cognitive and reasoning skills, elevated IQ, enhanced spatial reasoning, etc. It was then that her mother angrily denounced her daughter's interest in this game as only suitable for males and one that is not "proper" for girls. My anger boiled within me as she grabbed her daughter's hand and quickly walked away, her daughter's head hung low.
What she could have become.....what a waste.
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Comments: Read 11 or Add Your Own.
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Thursday, January 20th, 2005
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I would like to point out that idiocy is a preserved trait, one that I carry withing my genetic code with unwavering steadfastness. Walk with me dear friend and experience life as one who treads into areas reserved heretofore with the criminally insane....
I have enrolled into college after a twenty year absence, this after dropping out at the tender age of twenty to pursue a life of adventure and mayhem. So at the wizened age of forty I decided to finish up what I started and get my degree. I signed up for several classes and started this week. One of my classes (a prerequisite) is an Oral Communications course entitled Speech. I had already missed one or two sessions due to late registration and was eager to get back into the swing of things. For many people, taking a course in which one must stand in front of class and give lectures is a daunting task, fortunately I am not concerned with this public display as I address twenty thousand people every Monday night.
So off I went, leaving early so I could get to class before it began. I arrived on campus and dutifully approached the room that my class was to be held in. As I walked in I was somewhat surprised that the class as a whole had already assembled, in fact there was only one chair left. I immediately made my way to my seat as the entire class stared at me in what I considered at the time to be a strangely incredulous and collective gaze. Immediately upon sitting down, I noticed the students, one at a time, rising up and walking to the podium to give a five minute speech on various odd topics and noticed with no small appreciable horror that I was next in line, my chair being situated in the sequential order to necessitate my turn at the podium. Obviously they were already in the stage of preparing and giving speeches, testament to the several sessions that I had already missed. Immediately my mind rushed itself into emergency mode and I began to mentally prepare a speech in my head in the few seconds that remained for spontaneous creativity to manifest itself. No problem I thought, I can wing this, the trick being to just effortlessly glide through a eloquent narrative out of my past, a little humor here, a little humor there, and presto, I have redeemed my truancy through trickery (that and a resultant conversation with the professor afterward).
I strode up to the podium with great aplomb and delivered a robust, and what I thought at the time, articulate soliloquy on a series of dramatic events in my life. Needless to say, I was minutely aware that my choice of topic was slightly different from those given at hand, but nonetheless the muse was upon me. I noticed during my boisterous speech that I once again received the same incredulous stare, no doubt due to my prodigious oratory skills. I basked in the revelation that my peers were awestruck when faced with talent such as this. Then it dawned on me. I-was-in-the-wrong-class.
I had wandered into another class in session, not noticing the sign posted long ago on the door that my scheduled class had moved down the hall a week before. The incredulous stares were not ,as I sadly imagined, testament to my elocution, but rather of disbelief that an individual had wandered into class and immediately addressed the congregation at present with a topic quite unlike that of previous experiences within the confines of the subject matter at hand.
I basked in my stupidity, as the professor, who unbeknownst to me, was quietly confused behind his desk, timidly informing me that I was evidently in the wrong class, though he tactfully admitted to being smitten with my tales of adventure. It is at this point that my ancient genetic strain of idiocy manifested itself and I had an immediate vision of running naked through a grass field, burning huts littering the landscape as I grunted and flung my spear with great force at the newly appeared homo sapiens that had invaded my ancestral homeland.
I thanked them and quickly left the room. Later that night my wife laughed hard enough to risk a brain aneurysm as I sat in the bathtub, letting the water cleanse me of my unrightousness.....
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Comments: Read 4 or Add Your Own.
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Monday, December 13th, 2004
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I have always enjoyed bad prose, especially when it is done by authors who believe they are enriching us or society in general with their horrid and preposterous rhetoric; always under the pretense that it is anything other than just simply egregious. Well there is a British competition by the London Literary review in which it awards a top prize for the worst prose describing a sexual interlude. Though the competition was stiff they awarded top accolades to Tome Wolfe for this passage from his latest book, "I am Charlotte Simmons,": "Slither slither slither slither went the tongue, but the hand that was what she tried to concentrate on, the hand, since it has the entire terrain of her torso to explore and not just the otorhinolaryngological caverns -- oh God, it was not just at the border where the flesh of the breast joins the pectoral sheath of the chest -- no, the hand was cupping her entire right -- Now!"
Or how about this quotable literary masterpiece (and personal favorite of mine to win the competition) by Nadeem Aslam for his novel "Maps for Lost Lovers,": "His mouth looked for the oiled berry," one of his raunchiest passages starts. "The smell of his armpits was on her shoulders -- a flower depositing pollen on a hummingbird's forehead."
Ahhh, titillating! Beautiful, descriptive, and gloriously bad. For further readings of the contenders (including the most unique description of a woman's vulva I have ever read) go to: http://www.cnn.com/2004/SHOWBIZ/books/12/13/odd.literature.sex.reut/index.html
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Comments: Read 6 or Add Your Own.
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